Hello guys. Today I would love to talk about Litecoin (LTC) also known as silver to bitcoins gold with you. So can all interested crypto enthusiasts please get on board the litecoin train. We’re going to steam ahead full speed.

Everyone on board? Awesome let’s begin.

What is Litecoin(LTC)

Litecoin (LTC) is a peer-to-peer based decentralized cryptocurrency released under the MIT/X11 License. Another means of digital money, litecoin is a cryptocurrency that leverages the power of blockchain technology for maintaining a public ledger of all transactions with ease. It is a fork of bitcoin and used for directly transferring funds between individuals, businesses, etc. without the interference of any other intermediary such as a bank or payment processing service.

A former Google employee, named Charlie Lee is the founder of Litecoin(LTC). Charlie had a vision of complimenting bitcoins service. But he wanted his service to have faster transaction times and a higher number of coins that you could forge within the system. As a result, Charlie decided to launch litecoin by October 7, 2011, and on October 13, 2011, the litecoin network was live.

Litecoins can be forged and transferred employing an open source cryptographic protocol and are not managed by any central authority. More about mining litecoins in another article because it deserves another article.

Difference between Litecoin and Bitcoin

As stated in the introduction of this article Litecoin (LTC) is also known as silver to bitcoins gold. However, there are a couple of other differences as well between these two crypto giants. They are as following:-

Speed

On Bitcoins network, it takes roughly 10 minutes to forge 25 BTC. However, on the litecoins blockchain, it takes about 2.5 minutes for creating 50 Litecoins. Wowww. I mean 4 times the speed of bitcoin. That is pretty cool. Isn’t it? Although, many people would argue that it’s not a lot of waiting time but still it is a lot faster in comparison to bitcoin. Especially for an emergency trip to Starbucks or GameStop. Lol. Anyways, besides the speed element it also ( as I’m writing this article ) has a market cap of $10,812,623,863 and price of approximately over 190$+ which is quite spectacular in my opinion. Yayyy litecoin even though it is not worth thousands of dollars like Bitcoin.

Coin availability

Litecoin seems to be having the upper hand over bitcoin regarding coin availability. On the one side, we have Bitcoin which has a total supply of 21 million btc which can’t be exceeded within the blockchain. On the other hand, there is Litecoin that has four times the amount of coins as compared to bitcoin, i.e., 84 million litecoins that can be forged on its blockchain. Apart from this both bitcoin and litecoin can be divided into eight decimal places, i.e., you can buy 0.00000001 Litecoin or bitcoin if you want to. But the benefit of litecoin is that you can send and receive it faster and cheaper as compared to bitcoin.

Algorithm

Bitcoin makes use of the SHA-256 algorithm, whereas, Litecoin utilizes a comparatively new algorithm known as Scrypt. Alright, but what is the difference?

A significant difference between these types of algorithms is the impact that they have on the process of “mining” new coins. Both Bitcoin and Litecoin, require substantial amounts of computing power to confirm transactions. So, how is this accomplished? A couple of members of these networks, i.e., miners tend to allocate their computing power/resources for confirming the transactions of other users on the blockchain.

Alright. Awesome. But what’s in it for them? Are they idiots for doing this? Nope. These miners get rewarded by the cryptocurrency they mine. For example:- Bitcoin miners get BTC. Litecoin miners LTC, etc.

Okay. Now let’s get into a little bit of detail concerning these algorithms.

On the one hand, we have SHA-256 which is often deemed to be a little bit more on the techy side as opposed to Scrypt but it affords its users a greater degree of parallel processing. But the scenario nowadays seems to be that the miners tend to gravitate towards the use of Application-Specific Integrated Circuits (ASICs) for mining Bitcoin. The reason for this is that ASICs ( a hardware system ) can be tailor to or configured for the sole purpose of mining bitcoins. This makes the process of mining bitcoin a lot more efficient. However, because of this Bitcoin mining has become next to impossible for the common man. So that is cool but not so cool at the same time as well.

On the other hand, there is Scrypt which was created along with the purpose of being less susceptible to the kinds of custom hardware solutions that are employed in ASIC-based mining. As a result of this several cryptocurrency enthusiasts now tend to view Scrypt-based cryptocurrencies, such as Litecoinm, as something that is more accessible for users who desire to participate in the blockchain network as miners.

Transaction fees

In simple words, the transaction fees on bitcoins are the ceiling if litecoins transaction fee is to be considered the floor. For example:- On bitcoins network, you might need to spend 10, 15, 20$ or sometimes even more than that to send and receive your bitcoin. But with litecoin, you only have to pay 30 or 50 cents. Max. 1.5$ ( as per bitinfocharts.com ) as a transaction fee for sending and receiving your litecoin. This is beside the fact that litecoin is much faster than bitcoin regarding transaction speed and verification of transactions.

So that is it for this section of the difference between Bitcoin and Litecoin.

Consensus system/algorithm system

As mentioned earlier, Litecoin uses Scrypt for the process of mining coins on its blockchain. Therefore, I assume that it is safe to say that Litecoin uses Scrpyt in its proof of work algorithm. More information on Scrypt in another post.

What problems does Litecoin solve

As stated above, Litecoin is much faster and cheaper concerning transaction speed and verification. So the issues that it tends to resolve are that of speed, volume ( as in higher availability of litecoin as compared to bitcoin ) and cheaper transactions ( i.e., a low transaction fee ) as compared to bitcoin. It also seems to be more energy efficient than bitcoin regarding mining. The reason for this could be because it uses Scrypt instead of Sha-256 for its mining procedure.

Now as I far I know Litecoin still uses Scrypt although another hardware upgrade called Segwit is used by certain miners. Nevertheless, it still hasn’t gained widespread adoption as of now. It may get accepted a little or lot more in the future, but this is just my speculation on things here. So let us wait and watch.

Official Sources

Where to store Litecoins

Ledger Nano S: As always Ledger Nano S is on top of the list a highly recommended option to store your cryptocurrencies securely. The reason for this is this paragraph on their official site. Just reading it makes me feel secure about my funds. Anyways, enough chit-chat here is the paragraph “Ledger Nano S is a Bitcoin, Ethereum, and Altcoins hardware wallet, based on robust safety features for storing cryptographic assets and securing digital payments. It connects to any computer (USB) and embeds a secure OLED display to double-check and confirm each transaction with a single tap on its side buttons.”

Ledger Nano S should be a must-have for any crypto enthusiast; I am also using that. You can see how to config your ledger nano s here. Because if you’re making a lot of money through cryptocurrencies, then you will be less stressed if your private and public keys are stored safely in an offline wallet. Otherwise, you know what can happen.

Trezor Wallet: As Bitcoin was becoming popular amongst the masses of the world, a lot of people were getting worried regarding its security in 2014. Therefore, as a solution to this problem the Trezor wallet was created in a Czech Republic-based company known as SatoshiLabs, thus making it the first hardware wallet on the planet. It consists of a small OLED screen that displays a randomly generated nine digit pin code and a 24-word recovery seed to help you safely maintain your funds in an offline environment. You can also visit our post to learn what other cryptos are supported by Ledger wallet.

Exodus Wallet: Exodus is a multi-currency desktop wallet which provides its users with a one-click recovery system to restore a wallet with a 12-word recovery phrase. Its the top wallet to store your crypto for free.

Liteaddress: It’s a website that helps you to make your own pair of private/public keys and store them on paper in an offline environment. It is an economical and very safe alternative to hardware wallets. However, this could be tricky and even risky for some to a certain extent if handling a paper wallet isn’t your cup of tea.

Litecoin Core (Desktop Wallet): This Litecoin wallet is the official wallet that you can download on their website. This is a free to use desktop wallet which enables you to store your private keys on your desktop. You can now download it for use on Windows, Mac, and Linux.

Alright with this we arrive at the final stop for this post. Thank you so very much for joining us today for the lite-coin of an adventure. Please remember to follow us on Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, Instagram. One more thing before I take your leave, please do ask me any questions you may be having. Alright, bye guys take care and have a nice day.